How hard is it?

Hi,
My business is pretty much all on ebay. I have a tiny website which pretty much points to my ebay store.

I want to step things up.

I'm just not sure if it is worth it to pay someone to do it, or do it myself. I'm in no rush to pay someone a couple of grand to build it for me.

I guess what I am asking is, is it hard/really hard/omg I'm pulling out my hair hard to build a site from the ground up.

Just to fill in some info. I know how to build a site (far from the best but I know how to get by). I'm already running my own credit cards/have paypal. I would like to bring in money orders/e-checks.
Hosting/domain name I have. Traffic and all that fun stuff I know how to bring in. 866 number. I have close to 400 part number with many more coming down the pipe.

I just keep going back and forth between, building it myself, buying a monster template or handing it off to someone else to do.

 

maybe something in between, buy a ready template and fix it to your own need mate...

 

if your ebay business is doing so good, why buy a simple monster template or build some bad looking website? it will not be a dedicated project and i can understand why u don't want it to be a dedicated project (because u earn a lot on ebay), but then again, what about insurance policy if u will ever have a drop sales on ebay or ebay will die? wont u regret that u didn't had ur own website business in first place?

if ur ebay earnings are low, sure save some money and create a proper design and system, u can use some free ecommerce systems like magento, they look very good and are free or pay couple of grand to someone to build it. i, instead would use free one and have a good design, and leave the rest of the cash to marketing, to bring a lot of new clients and increase sales

 

Yeah ready to use template would save you a lot of time and effort. Ready to use templates are custom made that fit your needs. All you need to do is a coding and customization here and there.

 

i agree. Look for systems like magento or opencart, and see if they fit your needs. then look for templates. hopefully you won't need customisations after that. but if u do, then they should be fairly simple. otherwise, at that point of time, you can still approach someone else to help you with it.

 

Thanks for all your answers everyone!
I just don't want all of my eggs in one basket. I want to expand and grow my business
Thanks again for all the input!

 

If your main source of income is ebay and you are doing well there, then why not spend some grand and get best out of your site. Rather than having it just for sake of having website.

 

You should definitely consider opening a proper ecommerce store. There are too many what ifs with eBay.
There are a number of free and paid shopping carts available depending on your location.
Setting up a store takes time, effort and money. You learn each day, there is always something new. There are many things to take care of. Sometimes things seem overwhelming but a cool head and distrust for eBay get you moving along.

 

I suppose you should extend your business building a classic ecommerce store. You may ask/pay somebody to do it for you, but according to my experience if you want something to be done well you must do it. Some software allow you to send your items directly to eBay so deep integration can be achieved with them.

 

I think you should try to get a cart that would integrate with ebay somehow, if that's easy and inexpensive, or just be prepared to update your cart on a relatively frequent basis. Some carts can be modified to upload products in bulk or from a spreadsheet.

--->beware of "premade" templates that are supposed to go with a certain shopping cart. very often they have problems and will be a nightmare. If you are unfamiliar with the script, you can lose time and money (and maybe even hair!) lol but seriously... I read about this stuff all the time.

Example 1: The template installs into the cart fine but has bad or old code, which you will discover at some point. The bad code will end up breaking things, opening up security risks, stopping you from doing further mods, etc. = have fun eliminating the template or fixing your code. You must now rebuild your store, and, of course, get a new design as well.

Example 2: The template is made for a very old version of the cart, while you have the newest version, so it cannot be installed and you are refused a refund = waste of money and very frustrating. You are back to square 1.

What I would do is get a cart with a template system, and make your own, or spend a little cash to have someone experienced do it for you. If you add on a few mods to work with ebay or bulk upload, then it should be a worthwhile endeavor.

Good luck!

 

You can get a lot of help online for free. You can ask almost any ecommerce question on here and get a good answer.

 

get a ready made template and change it according to your needs, hope it will work